


Missed Connections

by foolishnotions



Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Comic Book Violence, M/M, Pre-Slash, WinterHawk Big Bang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2019-02-12 10:20:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12957165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foolishnotions/pseuds/foolishnotions
Summary: Clint Barton and the Winter Soldier have been ruining each others' days for years.  Now, they've finally met.





	Missed Connections

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Winterhawk Reverse Big Bang 2017, with much love to [prompt_fills](https://archiveofourown.org/users/prompt_fills) for making the art that inspired this. You can find that [by clicking here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12945222). Seriously, go look. It's _wonderful_.  
>  All of the images used in this work are also by prompt_fills and presented with permission.
> 
> Profound thanks go to [Florianna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Florianna/) and [Pohadka](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Pohadka) for the beta. You're the best.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who participated in the challenge with me, this was a genuine joy to do.

  

  
**NOW.**

Clint wasn’t sure what made him pick up the call.  He was pretty sure that there was something in the Rules about picking up strange calls from unknown numbers.  He was pretty sure this was how guys like him got knocked out and tied up to chairs in warehouses.

Well, it was a boring afternoon and he had just stocked his freezer with peas and his cabinets with gauze and tape.  He was good. His finger barely hovered on the button before he answered the call. 

The voice on the other end was breathing in a way that sounded not at all healthy.  By now, Clint knew what aspirating blood sounded like.

A gasp.  An intersection.  A gurgle. A clatter. Silence.

Clint rubbed his face and sighed, reaching into his newly stocked first aid cabinet.

 It wasn’t far and, if he was in and out, the Avengers didn’t need to know.

When Clint finally found the place the voice on the other end of the call had given him, all he found was the phone. It lay on the ground next to the rest of the mess, Clint’s own face staring back at him from the contacts page.

Huh.

His eye followed the phone off to the side, casting out for more than what was immediately visible.

A hand.  An arm.  A body. 

Face down and unconscious, lying on the floor a little away from the open window.  As far as Clint could tell, he was alive, barely.

“Shit, shit shit,” Clint muttered, the reality of what was going on finally sinking in.  “This is more than a little outside my first aid capabilities.”

He paced for a moment, trying to workout his options before crouching beside the body, examining it.  Surely this was the sort of thing being a frequent emergency room visitor was good for.

The body was filthy and pale, its face was hidden by long, dark hair.  When he turned him over, he was bleeding profusely from a wound in his gut.

An uneasy feeling settled low in Clint's stomach as he examined the body and did his best to slow the bleeding. 

When it finally became clear that he would have to move the man, Clint reached over to grab the man’s left arm to adjust he body.  He froze. 

He recognised the body right away.

He was going to have to stay and help.

**NOW.**

Clint watched as the Soldier started to stir, adjusting his posture so he was standing on the balls of his feet.  This could go bad so many ways.  The Soldier he had recovered from the alley had been unconscious and had lost a lot of blood when he arrived.  That was a day and a half ago, and Clint had been trying to work out in his head whether he needed to find a doctor.  He wasn’t ready for that, couldn’t answer the types of questions that would come up in an emergency room.

So he substituted gauze and medical tape and hope that it would be okay.

And now the Soldier was moving, and he had no idea what to expect.

The Soldier stirred again, his breathing starting to accelerate.  Clint returned his attention to him, a cool, damp towel in one hand.

He also had a taser on hand, just in case.

The Soldier stirred again, gasping this time, shifting on the couch.  He flexed a hand, then the other, the one that had already so terrified Clint before. Clint’s hand moved a little closer to the taser.

It didn’t matter, in the end. When the Soldier lunged at him, he did it with the terrifying tin hand outstretched, swinging Clint’s chin before he could subdue it, or any other part of the Soldier.  He coughed, and shoved at the Soldier’s body but it was no use.  By the time he'd recovered enough from the pain and the shock, the Soldier had already made for the window.  Glass sparkled across an empty floor. The Soldier was gone.

 

  
**BEFORE.**

He fell from a window and ruined everything.  This mass of black clothes and purple and bandages came down from the same building but higher up— a building the man occupying it had secured— and suddenly a straightforward mission was in danger of failure.

The thing that had fallen past, and then crawled into the window lay on the floor where his rifle had been a moment before, plasters on his face and a suggestion of gauze wrapped around a bicep under his stained, pale t-shirt. 

Something clicked into place inside him.  Witness.  He looked down at the man at his feet, already badly beaten and apparently unconscious.  Easy.  It took moments to hurl the mass of blond hair and purple plasters through the window and back down into the alley a dozen floors below along with a rain of glass.  He waited for the dull noise a body made on the pavement, followed by the crunch and tinkle as the glass settled around and on top of him.  Satisfied, he returned to his nest.  He still had his mission.

His rifle was gone.  As was his handgun.  As was his knife.

No matter.  He had other choices.

Abandoning his perch, the Soldier left to seek our a more direct solution.

**NOW.**

The first thing the Soldier noticed was a tingling sensation on his fingers.  The ones made of flesh, not the ones that could malfunction.  He flexed his fingers and found the tingling went up his arms.  Trying to sit up sent sharp pains through most of his torso.  He suppressed the gasp, barely, and sunk back down into the soft surface he’d been laying on.

Soft.

He renewed his attempts to sit up and struggle immediately, ignoring the pain.  He forced his eyes open, a thing he had been avoiding doing until it was necessary, and looked around.  Dingy white walls, grubby furniture, one window boarded up, and now that he was assessing his surroundings, and coffee.  Everything smelled like coffee.

“Oh no you don’t.  Not this time.”

A hand somewhere behind him put a stop to his third attempt to sit up, guiding him back down into the cushions beneath him.

“Stay put.  I can re-dress that hole in your gut all you want but if you rip it back open, there isn’t a lot I can do.”

The Soldier scowled, but shrugged and relaxed for the time being. It was a cheap apartment.  Likely locked, but not a threat.  He could go, if he really wanted.  Finally, he turned his head to look at his captor? His rescuer?  His nurse? He stared.

Oh.

He flexed his fingers on his left hand, formed it into a fist, tensed his body and resumed assessing his options for a quick exit.

He knew the man holding him down, a memory of pain and spasms up his arm. He shuddered and began to struggle again, ripping at the arms holding him down.  They stayed and the giddy, fuzzy feeling resumed, making it harder to fight him.

It wasn’t until Bucky had exhausted his strength struggling that the man behind him let go and backed up again.

“You already made for the window once.  Not much of a getaway, but I thought for a minute you were going to break my jaw fighting to get out,” the man said finally, rubbing his face and drawing attention to where a big, black bruise was starting to form on one side of his chin.  “Maybe next time you want to make a break for it, you can just walk out the door, instead of beating me up and making for the window?”

The Soldier nodded, frowning. The man continued.

“You know, for someone who’s been shot, you’re awfully eager to just be on your way,” he said, handing over a glass of water.  The Soldier took it, but didn’t drink.

“You’re going to want at least some of that,” the man shrugged.  The Soldier just watched him.

“I know it won’t make you want to eat anything I give you, but my name’s Clint.  You’ve probably figured out by now that you were shot.  You’ve been out for two days.  Except for the time you woke up and tried to make a break for it.  I found you on the fire escape.  You were in pretty rough shape,” he brightened after a moment.

“But you’re looking a lot better.”

The Soldier still didn’t say anything.  He stared, first at the water, then at Clint.  Clint.  It was good to have a name, he supposed.  From somewhere, he remembered names were important.  Certainly, it was better than the man who wouldn’t stop wearing the dirty purple clothes.

Ultimately, he shrugged and drank the water.  Clint watched him expectantly.

As he did and as he became more aware of what was around him, including the cold, wet nose that had insinuated itself onto his leg and under his hand.  He looked down to find blond fur and floppy ears.

He froze.

“Hey, hey, hey, easy.  Easy,” Clint dove in grabbed the animal back right away, easing it out of the way.

“Sorry, that’s Lucky,” he said finally.  “He means well but I’ll understand if you don’t want all that fur and drool hampering your recovery.”

The dog gave a little whine as he was ushered away, and the Soldier adjusted himself as he watched it go.

Then he gasped. 

Something had stabbed him.

For a moment, he struggled, preparing to run again. He cast about in search of whatever was tearing a hole in his leg.  He squirmed, and dug, and finally, his fingers closed around it.

He tore it away from his leg, lifted it for a better look.

It was an arrow.

**BEFORE.**

Brightly coloured props loomed large inside the canvas tent as the Soldier strode inside it.  He paused briefly, assessing the situation.  As he did, a suggestion of cheerful music and the smell of fried dough crossed his memory along with flashes, barely observed, of aerial stunts and clownish antics.  They didn’t last, and the Soldier was briefly left with a sense that this was bizarre, but no understanding as to why. No matter, he had tracked his objective to this place, this was where he would intervene.

A man in a sequinned tailcoat was standing on a scaffold at the far end of the tent, fiddling with some ropes and swearing at them.  The Soldier crossed the gap, slicing the ropes and piercing the heavy canvas tent with a bullet.  A second shot brought the tailcoated man tumbling to the hard-packed ground.  A third, a spray of shots, really, brought the scaffolding down around him. The Soldier approached the trapped man, who was stammering, terrified.  A moment later, a package tumbled down from above, clearly having been caught in the ropes above and freed by the commotion. It was wrapped in a paper grocery bag and fell to the ground, striking the ringmaster— where did that word come from— unconscious.  The Soldier bent, seizing the package and extended his arm to eliminate the witness.

A snapping sound interrupted him, followed by an ungodly crunch.  Spasms shot up and down his left arm, causing it to twitch.

When he brought his arm around to look at it, he found an arrow lodged between the plates of his forearm.

Immobilise the arm.  Grab the arrow.  Dislodge…

As the Soldier pulled to remove the projectile and effect repairs, the tip of the arrow snapped off.  Fluid began to leak out immediately, spilling over itself as it hardened.  He released the arrow in just enough time to keep the use of his right arm as the rapidly hardening fluid overtook the left.

He grabbed his knife in a vain attempt to cut himself free of the mass but it continued to leak out, encasing not only his arm, but part of his boot as well.

A dull blow to his head and a hard push forward from the shoulder interrupted his efforts to deal with the situation.  Part of his chest and most of his shoulder were forced into the mass just before it hardened. A man in purple sprang off his back, boot pressing hard into it as he sprang up and over him.  The Soldier reached out with his remaining hand to grab the intruder as he sprang away.

A tear, a cracking noise, a rustle of fabric.

A moment later, the Soldier pulled back a boot.  It was damaged and purple and reminded him of something he couldn’t place.  It didn’t matter.  The man who wore it was gone.

The objective, too, had been taken.

Sirens in the distance made it clear that reinforcements were coming, and that they would find him in short order.

**NOW.**

The Soldier sat up and shook out the cobwebs after a long moment, and took a look at Clint.  His arm was still throbbing with the memory as it faded back into the distance.  He hadn’t had a good look back then, but the arrows hidden between the couch cushions confirmed it.  This was the man from the circus.  And probably from the building, if the brightly coloured plasters were any indication.

And here he was, feeding the Soldier fluids and changing his gut wound dressing.

He was still sitting on the coffee table with a dopey grin on his face, watching expectantly.

“You know, I'm entirely okay with you staying here and convalescing.  I mean, I don’t know why you want to, but I think it’s a good idea, so here we are.  But it would do me some good to call you something other than ‘The Murder Guy’ which is what I’ve been going with since I saw how you were decked out in that alley.”

A lie. The Soldier continued to stare.

“Oh no, this isn’t how it’s going to be.  I mean, I read the news, I know what face was plastered all over it for weeks a while ago and all that, but I don’t know what you're calling yourself these days.  And I kind of want to start there.”

The Soldier stopped, shifting uncomfortably on the couch, causing the hole in his chest to hurt, bad.  When the pain subsided, he shrugged again. He only vaguely remembered having a name at all.

Soldier. Asset. Barnes.

Something like the pain in his chest shot through him as he worked through his options.

Bucky.

The thought had barely crossed his mind when the aching began.

“James,” he said finally. 

It would do.

Clint nodded.  “All right then. You can get up and move around if you want, but I don’t really recommend it. How are you feeling?”

James shrugged again, unwilling to admit to the pain in his gut, or the one in his side, or the spasms in his arm.

It occurred to him, that he would have to, in time.  He had the vague idea that he had been wounded before but no memory of receiving care.  Or really of the pain, so he was silent again.

“Okay, then.  I have some questions, when you’re feeling better.  Not least about your motivations for calling this screwup when you were at death’s door,” with that, he pointed his thumbs at himself and quirked his lips into a smirk that made James’ frown deepen.

“You said you were great at plans.”

James blurted it out, without a thought and without wanting to.

Clint reached up and scratched the back of his own head.

“Aha, yeah. About that…”

 

  
**BEFORE.**

This has got to be the most tits-up a mission can go.

For Clint, that meant holing up in a supply closet, wrapping a wrist he suspected was broken in plumber’s tape before it could get any worse.  Outside, some masked maniac— the wrong kind of masked maniac— was destroying a lot of very specialised, very expensive-looking lab equipment in what Clint suspected was an attempt to destroy evidence or someone’s work, or something.

He hadn't received what he’d call a complete briefing about this mission when he had been sent on it, either.

Either way, it had all fallen apart about five minutes before, and now the scientist he was supposed to rescue was dead, the sleeper agent that had turned on him was gone, and this lunatic was running amok in a lab that was supposed to be abandoned now.

What the hell, the other guys are not supposed to also have superheroes.  This isn’t fair. 

He peered through the vents in the utility closet door, watching the maniac’s movements, trying to decide upon the best way to make his escape, and maybe put a stop to the carnage in enough time to salvage some research.

He had a room full of probably dangerous cleaning products, some tools, the tape.  Not much else.  The arrows were outside.

Of course the arrows were outside.

It didn’t turn out to matter.

It did turn out that assessing his options, while also using one hand to immobilise the other one, had left him vulnerable to stupid.  Specifically, the kind of stupid that sent the toolbox on the shelf clattering to the floor.  A screwdriver damn near poked him in the eye, a hammer landed on his foot, and a jar of screws…

Oh shit, the jar of screws.

The jar had smashed on the floor and its contents spilled out, mostly under the door and out into the main lab.  Clint grabbed the hammer in a desperate attempt to defend himself once the lunatic outside realised he had given away his position.

He didn’t get much time to prepare himself, as it turned out.  Before he had a chance to grab the hammer, the heavy glass on the door shattered around a large, metal fist that had punched through it.  The hand was grasping about and a moment later, had Clint by the collar.

“Okay.  I stand corrected. This is the most tits-up a mission can go.”

**NOW.**

Clint watched from the kitchen as James ate, and ate, and ate.  Watching the guy who had almost killed him at least twice slowly recover in his living room was starting to feel like something he could deal with, now.  Certainly, the absence of a terrifying face mask and high powered rifle had certainly helped some. It helped even more that James had managed to warm up to Lucky, who was now sitting sadly between the man and the food with a hopeful look in his eye.

James wasn’t sharing yet.

He chuckled or himself and returned to trying to clean a bunch of past-date food out of his cabinet, frowning.  He really had to keep a handle on this shit.  For a while, he stopped watching, his mind wandering back to almost dying in a botched rescue.

At least that’s what he'd been doing when he heard an ungodly clatter followed by a startled whine.  His coffee table had been upturned and Lucky was barrelling toward Clint’s legs.

Crap.

He frowned and scrambled out into the living room to see James ducked behind the couch, tin fingers gripping the back cushions to the point of tearing the fabric.

“Whoa, hey, what happened,” he asked as he corralled the dog in the kitchen. James’ death grip on the couch intensified, as far as Clint could tell.

Lucky curled up guiltily in the corner.

Oh. Well, then.

“Hey, easy,” Clint started, slowly making his way into the room.  “It’s okay, the dog is gone now, promise.  He’s in the kitchen and he won’t bother you or your food.”  As he approached, Clint saw that the coffee table had been broken in the commotion. “Dog got up in your face, did he?”

Clint kept his expression even as best he could and ignored the bowl of soup that was laying upturned on the floor. James nodded, but his eyes were darting around.  Clint didn’t bother to wonder what he was looking for and stood back.

“He’s gone,” Clint said again when James’ eyes stopped darting around and turned to him.  “It’s okay, you’re safe.”

He smiled sheepishly.  “You’re not going to find a knife or a machine gun in here anyway.”

James looked down, shoulders slumping a little and brought his good hand forward into view.  A sheepish look crept across his face as his fingers loosened around an arrow he had picked up, probably from under the couch.

Oh.  Crap.

“Okay, so maybe you’ll find a great many arrows instead.  Maybe you don’t want to be holding that right now.  That looks like a putty head and that’ll end in tears and some ugly cleanup for both of us.”

James looked down at it again, putting it down in a hurry once he realised what he had in his hand.

“Good choice,” Clint didn't reach over to pick it up right away.  Instead, approached a little, reaching across and holding his hand out to James. 

“You know, I have a room you can maybe sleep in for now, where the dog can't bother you.  Would that be better?”

It was quiet for a long time.

Finally, James stood up, nodding.

“Yes.  Please?”

A moment later, he grabbed Clint's hand, crossing the gap.

He stepped on the arrow.

**BEFORE.**

Done. Out.  MacGuffin obtained. The guys that needed sniping have been sniped.  The facility isn’t a pile of rubble, but they had warned Clint against that sort of thing.  He supposed that somebody had told them about the lunatic that ran amok on his mission last year.  No matter, the building was still standing this time, so he was prepared to call it a win all around.

He boarded a bus to take him halfway across town and from there, hopped into one of the cars parked on the side of the road.

Sorry, stranger.  I’ll bring it back, promise.

It didn’t start.  Shit.

Because of course it didn’t.  Whatever stupid whatdoyoucallit he’d been issued to mess with the electronics and commandeer a car was always going to fail and he’d be left to…

Crap.

He gasped as something cold and metallic grabbed him by the collar, hauling him back against the driver’s seat.  It yanked him harder, tearing his jacket and ultimately giving Clint some freedom of movement.  It wasn’t much, but it was enough to reach his arm around to find what was holding him.  He grabbed.

Cotton. That was unexpected.  He yanked, trying to pull the thing behind him into view.  Whoever was behind him moved, releasing him in the process. Clint whirled around, gaping a little as he took in the scene behind him.

Dirty clothes, shaggy hair, and a backpack thrown into the backseat.

Well, if he was going to go, taken out by a boring car thief would be, at least, unexpected.

The guy on the back seat stared at him, looking lost, but he sank back into the seat, away from where he had been holding Clint moments before.

Clearly, he had been expecting someone else.

“Sorry, Buddy,” he said finally once he was sure that the guy behind him wasn’t going to lunge again.  “I can’t let you steal this car.  I need to steal this car.”

The man in the back stared.  Clint shifted uncomfortably as he leaned over the driver’s seat. 

“Er, officially, I mean,” he finally added. No response.

“Look, buddy, I’d love to stare at you all afternoon, but I need this car to get out of town, and I can’t have you in it,” Clint said, quietly snaking one of his arms along the side of the car.  Around the time he’d finished speaking, his fingers found the latch for the side door.  He pulled.

Then he gasped, choking a little as the backseat headrest collided with his neck.  The man in the backseat had grabbed his wrist, and was attempting to crush it, quite literally, in an iron grip.

“Okay, maybe I can let you steal this car.”

 

  
**NOW.**

James hadn't left his new bedroom in days, not since Clint had offered it to him.  He'd become used to the worried looks and the soft spoken, casual offers to talk, or for more help.  Mostly, though, James wanted the peace and quiet.  He wanted information, too.  He convinced Clint to let him have a computer and an internet hook-up.

He was fairly certain that he wasn’t supposed to have the internet yet, but Clint had been pretty busy, what with replacing the coffee table, the couch and the window.  And most of the floor after the incident with the putty arrow.  James hadn’t wanted to see him much after that.  Neither had he been in much of any condition to help with the cleanup.  He imagined spasms up his arms, just thinking about it.

During that time, he had modified the room.  Less stuff, empty space, pushed everything to the wall.  A space for his clothes.  Clint had brought him clean ones.  A space to eat.  Cleaner than the kitchen.  Lucky had got into the spoiled food on the counter.  A space for reading away from the bed.  He needed to be up and around.  Just not go out.  He wasn’t going out.

What he'd found was more interesting than the room with the dog, anyway.  He'd stolen some information, paper files from the time he’d been taken, but nothing like what had been put on the internet in recent months.

And down he went. 

Twice, he forgot to eat.

Once, he forgot where he was.

Clint's standing in the door brought him back to things.  After he'd made a lunge at him in an attempt to get out and to somewhere more secure. He was getting stronger.  The force of the blow had brought Clint to the floor.  When the shock of it all wore off, Clint had laughed.  But something fell in the bottom of James’ gut. 

If it went bad, he couldn’t stay here.

**BEFORE.**

“So, you don’t want the car. You don’t want to go anywhere in particular. And you don’t want to hurt me,” the man behind the steering wheel had been talking, and talking and talking since the Soldier had made himself known.  He was not who the Soldier had been expecting, though there was something vaguely familiar about him, something that tugged somewhere underneath the fog.

But there were a lot of things that had done that, and none of them had turned out to be good.

Finally, he shrugged.  The man sitting at the wheel wasn’t who the Soldier had been expecting. He was looking for one of the people who had held him over the years. One of the people who had given him orders.

One of the people with access.

This wasn’t one of those people.  He wouldn’t do.

“Drive,” he finally said, interrupting whatever the man was saying now.  The Soldier hadn’t been listening.

The Soldier was surprised that the man complied.  He was expecting a fight, or for the man to run away, anything but this.

“Anywhere special,” the man asked finally. The Soldier shrugged again.

“Good, then we can go where I want to go, and then you can go on with stealing the car, or whatever you want.

The Soldier let the man carry on again as they pulled out onto the road, away from the city, to the highway.  Far enough for the traffic to mostly dissipate.  The Soldier examined interior of the car.

New. Sterile.  No information to be had.  Next to him on the back seat, a duffel bag.  Shabby, stained, torn.  The interloper in the driver’s seat had put it there.  Inside, a quiver, bow, arrows.  Clearly not meant for hunting animals.

The Soldier frowned. The thing under the fog tugged harder.

“You know me,” he said finally. 

The driver paused his monologue.

“Come again?”

The Soldier pushed one of the arrows into the space between the front seats, just far enough for the driver to see.

“This is yours.”

The driver pulled over immediately, rubbing the back of his neck as he parked the car on the shoulder.

“You know me,” the Soldier repeated, louder, this time.

“Ah, well I mean not to go to your birthday party, not exactly,” he said finally. “I know not a lot of guys who can destroy a good jacket like that on a whim, though.  So, I mean, I’m guessing we’ve met professionally at some point.”

The Soldier kept quiet, unsure of what to say next.  In truth, he hadn’t been expecting such a frank admission.

“Why, you uh, want to come work for the good guys,” there was laughter in the guy’s voice when he asked. The Soldier ignored it.

“Ok, then,” he said, posture stiffening as he put the car back into gear.  “Let’s uh, keep going then?”

He got quiet at that point, and the Soldier sat back again.  A moment later, he turned on the radio, mumbling something about the silence.

He pulled over again immediately.  The news had come on.

The voice on the radio read off a series of facts about a disturbance half a country away, about things that happened just days ago.  It threw words like SHIELD around, words like Hydra.  Names that made the Soldier sit straighter, stiller.  In the front seat, the man driving’s shoulders slumped.

“Oh,” was all he had to say when the radio returned to music that was too loud and too busy and he glanced up in the rear-view mirror at the Soldier. 

“You know them,” the Soldier finally said.  The driver nodded. 

“I need to find them,” the Soldier was as shocked by the statement as the driver seemed to be. 

“You have to know I can’t let you do that, not if you’re looking for instructions.  Hell, I’m not even sure I could do that for me anymore,” something had changed in the voice, it was wavering now.

“Not for instructions.  For answers.”

Again, the words came out too fast, too emphatic.  Too earnest.

There was a nod from the front seat.

“Good reason.”

**NOW.**

“I could use your help, you know.”

James didn’t hear much through the walls, Clint was working pretty hard at making sure he couldn't, but he heard the plea.  Quiet, and desperate, and right.

He tensed and sank deeper into the bed where he’d been resting. He was well enough now to go investigate, but something held him back. He listened harder.

“… you know I can’t do that.”

“This is important.”

Bucky was both surprised, and not, to hear himself whispering that along with the man Clint was talking to, that he'd known where this conversation was going to go. He knew he’d have to confront that voice, someday, knew that Clint was too close to it, had put together that they’d been friends.  He didn’t know that Rogers would come here.  Certainly, he didn’t expect, didn’t want, couldn’t deal with it being so soon.

“Well I mean I could go with you, but I don’t know what good I’d be,” something in the voice that time, laughing, but not.  Accusing, but not.

“Clint…”

“No, way man.  I got things to do.  Lucky’s got to go to the vet.” Real joking, this time.  Dog whining.

James frowned.

A pause, a sigh, a click of the door.

James lay down deeper into the couch, muscles relaxing as much as he would let them.  Everything still ached though he was sure he was on the way to recovery.  He had to be.  Not that he could remember ever recovering before.

It took a while for Clint to re-enter the room, but when he did, he had water and what looked like cereal on a tray.

“You didn’t tell him I was here,” he finally asked, confused.

“You said you didn’t want to see him.”

Clint shrugged, setting the tray down within reach.  “The cereal is going to get gross if you don’t eat it, but we can talk later.”

James frowned, eyeing the bowl suspiciously.

“Just like that?”

Clint shrugged,

“Suit yourself.  You're the one eating soggy Mini-Wheats,” he gave James a little smile. “I figure it does Steve good to not be right for a while.”

He shifted awkwardly.

“If that happens to suit your needs just fine, then good.”

James stared at him a moment.  Was he being serious?  James couldn't tell.

Clint’s grin widened.

 

  
**BEFORE.**

“You do realise that we’re parked outside a super-secret warehouse run by a super-secret military group, in a car we stole from one of their super-secret henchmen, right,” Clint couldn’t believe he said that out loud.  He honestly couldn’t believe he had to say that out loud. He had spent the last week very pointedly ignoring the notion that he used to belong to that group. 

There was no avoiding it anymore.

Beside him, having graduated to the passenger seat, the Soldier nodded.

“I know, I know.  You need to go inside, you need to know, and you can’t tell me why you need this one, in particular. Okay,” he laid his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes, rubbing his face.

“You know, I probably know people in there.  I could go in with you.  You could probably do with the backup.”

More quiet.  Guess not.

He glanced at the Soldier again, frowning.  A week of preparations, a week of calling in every favour he had, with every person he was pretty sure could still be trusted.  Well, except Natasha.  He’d have to talk to her about all this later, but for now he’d decided it was better to leave her out of it. Still, he’d found a place that was likely to have the information this guy needed, or thought he needed, or whatever.  He still didn’t have a lot of information.

He had gotten some of the answers he wanted for himself already, and the news had filled in the blanks as to who this Soldier had been.  Might still be.

Either way, it didn’t seem to matter.  Whoever he was, he didn’t want Clint’s help.

Still no response from beside him, who just stepped out of the passenger seat.

“Last chance,” Clint said, with a small smile he could barely muster. “ I know all you’ve seen of me is a train wreck, but if I’m going in there to help, I’m a goddamn professional.”

At that, the Soldier’s stiff posture and set jaw wavered, just for a moment, then recovered, starting to close the passenger side door.

“Hey, hey wait,” Clint said finally and a little desperately, grabbing something out of his jacket pocket. He tossed it across the empty space, where the Soldier caught it in mid-air and looked down at it.  A cellphone.

“It’s a crappy supermarket model, but if it all turns to shit inside, you can give me a call.”

The Soldier stared at it a little longer, then up at Clint.  For a second, it looked like he might change his mind.  Then, he pocketed the phone.

In silence, he slammed the passenger door and walked away.

Clint stared after him.

 

  
**BEFORE.**

Bucky had heard the gunshot, but what he remembered was a tingle and a giddy feeling.  He’d been shot before.  Of course he’d been shot before.  But that was also sort of the point, it was before, and this was now.  And he laughed out loud as the blood spread across his shirt and dripped onto the pavement. 

“How the fuck did I miss that,” he thought as he sank down between the buildings, glancing up at the windows, trying to determine through the haze of blood loss that was overtaking him which of them had a shooter behind it. He laughed again when he realised what he was trying to do.

That’s when the pain kicked in, sharp inside his lungs, reminding him the situation was urgent.

The pain brought his situation back into focus. Help.  He was going to need help.  He tried to breathe again.  More pain.  Tried to stand up.  No go.  Move his arms.  Only his left.  A moment later his fingers found the phone tucked into his hoodie pocket.  Only one number in it. 

It would have to do.

**NOW.**

James had been alone for two days.  Long enough for the novelty of having the run of the place and nobody to guide him gently away from places like the equipment cabinet to wear off.  Long enough for wariness, and eventually trepidation to set in.  Panic would be coming soon.

This wasn’t unexpected. Clint had spent a lot of time preparing James for this possibility before he left.

“The dog is with my friend, he can’t bother you,” irrelevant, as he had since mended his relationship with the beast. Honestly, he’d reached the point where he wished Clint hadn’t thought to provide for Lucky’s care with someone else.  He could have done with the company, even company that had frightened him a week ago.

“You are the only person with a key, nobody can disturb you that doesn’t deserve getting their face punched in,” useful information, but not particularly helpful for dealing with interlopers.

“I can’t tell you where I’m going or why, but the plan is to be back.  And I’m great at plans,” that was provably a lie.  But a comforting one.

James paced around the apartment again.  He had seen the equipment, seen the board kept behind a curtain in a closet, filled with bits he recognised and bits he didn’t, quite.

Before Clint had left, he had been pronounced well enough to go outside if he wanted to. This was based on, as far as James could tell, no evidence whatever.  When he had tried though, a few steps in the open street were enough to send him scurrying back to the relative comfort of the apartment.

And now, two days had gone by.

He looked down at the mobile phone that he’d had when Clint found him.  It was silent.  It had been silent all this time.

He didn’t even know if Clint would think to call.  Didn’t know if it was safe to call again.  Didn’t know if it would be safe to stay here if Clint didn’t return.

He had to go.

Down the stairs and out into the street.  Bright sun, noisy cars.  Loud talking he didn’t properly hear or understand. He broke into a run, blocking out the street and the people, and the daylight as he he went.

Until he staggered, and then he stumbled.  Pain shot through his sides and he kept going anyway.  He had stayed too long, Clint was waiting for him to go.

He tripped again, pain shooting through his midsection.  He fell to one knee, got up. Something had happened, something had gone wrong.  It wasn’t safe to stay. 

Finally, something in him buckled and gave in.  He slumped against the brick of a building, and then nothing.

Soft fur and a cold, damp dog nose were what greeted him next.  Still crumpled on the floor, the brick wall was still behind him but in front of him was blond fur.  And something that caused his eyes to snap open abruptly.

Dangling in front of him was a backpack.  Beat up, torn and threatening to disintegrate under the weight of whatever was inside, but familiar.  It was his. It was missing, when he woke up at Clint’s place.

It was hanging from Clint’s hand, along with Lucky’s leash.

“Hey, hey you’re okay,” the voice was gentle, and it was Clint’s.  And it was unhelpful. “Well, I mean you’re clearly not, because you’re clearly not well enough to go for a morning jog yet, but here we are.”

That was more like it.

Clint smiled sheepishly as he bent to help James up, supporting him as much as possible.  “Are you okay to walk?”

James shrugged, and the effort caused him to buckle a little bit.

“I guess that settles that.” Clint’s grip tightened around James’ midsection, supporting him as they started back.

“You gotta stop doing this, or you’re going to stay a mess, and that’d be bad for all of us.  You don’t want to stay, that’s fine.  But uh, maybe at least let me help you get more than a few blocks away.”

James turned his head and stared, stiffening.  He’d be strong again before too long, could go on his own.  He could go now.  Or he could stay.

Clint continued, seemingly without having noticed.

He carried on talking too, low, and soothing, and James wasn’t listening at all, except in snatches.  Something about him having taken off.  Something about the dog.

Something about the bag. He snapped his head up, stopped walking, planted his legs so Clint couldn’t move him along.

“You found it. Where?”

“You remember the last place you were before you got shot?”

James stared. “That’s where you went.”

Clint gave him a crooked smile, starting to urge him forward, just gently, just a little.

“If you want, we can go through it all together, get you your answers. Once and for all.”

James paused, staring at him a moment, before giving in, letting Clint walk him back.

Yeah, he could stay here a while.

 


End file.
